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The Anti-Spam Research Group's Plan for Spam
egoff writes "Speaking of standards, the ASRG, a member of the IETF, has a plan for "consent-based communications." Among the suggestions, according to Internet Week, are authentication services for falsified addresses, trusted senders, reputation systems (karma?), opt-out tools, best practices for challenge/response, and even a proposal for micropayments on unwanted mail. Instead of defining spam, the ASRG wants to provide administrators and users the tools necessary to avoid what they consider to be unwanted. One of the tools, Reverse MX, is expected to be in place in several months. It would allow the receiving mail server to query a domain to determine if the sending server is allowed to send on its behalf."
"One of the tools, Reverse MX, is expected to be in place in several months. It would allow the receiving mail server to query a domain to determine if the sending server is allowed to send on its behalf."
This would more or less force spammers to send from their own domains... Or from ISP's that are spam friendly.
It might not STOP spam (though blacklisting would be easier), but it'd make it traceable...
Which would make it easier to file complaints under the anti spam laws.
Corporatism != Free Market
1. They were about things I gave a damn about
2. They were marked (like ADV:) for easy filtering
What bothers me about spam are the violations of those two. I don't want emails about printer toner, or bigger schlongs. And I don't like having ads clutter up my inbox, where email from people I know and such belongs.
But if I could filter it all into an "Ads" mailbox, just like I have mailboxes for various mailing lists, I would scan the offers about stuff I might actually want. I'd be much more inclined to "click through" then, while my all-time number of click-throughs of spam email to date totals 0.
I like the idea; the problem is getting uptake on it. You need to encourage a lot of people. The way to do this is to get the "big" ISPs in on the scheme immediately. Participants should alter their mail transfer programs to tag the SUBJECT line of the messages with the word Untrusted. This will cause receivers to know, and significant embarrassment for those not participating...which will cause their mail system to be upgraded to participating status.
Unless the bad effects of not participating are directly visible (as in subject line), it's gonna take too long.
Spam is now the enemy. It must be destroyed. Here comes the IETF to solve the problem.
SMTP Next Generation is on its way. The only question is the exact design. The general outline is already known. First, there will be real-world verification of identity tied to every account capable of sending SMTP NG e-mail. There will be a transition period where people can sign up for "upgraded" (NG) e-mail accounts; then, a period where these "upgraded" accounts can receive e-mail from other NG accounts as well as from old, potentially anonymous accounts. Business and government users will transition to NG.
Then, there will be an Internet-wide deadline, upon which all NG e-mail addresses will be unable to receive e-mail except from other NG addresses. All SMTP old generation traffic will be blocked. The old base of mail users will be forced to transition to SMTP NG. At this point, if there is ever a complaint about spam, the spammer can be tracked down and booted off Internet e-mail forever. As a result, spam will cease to exist.
The day the Internet died. Sure, it will be more "efficient" then. No spam. But it won't be free.
Don't cry about it. It happens to all technology. Those who need anonymous communications will just move to something else. Maybe web-based discussion, for example. Just no more truly private, truly anonymous, or truly free e-mail.
Coming soon to your neighborhood.
Spam is simply not profitable enough to last much longer. It is the last of a dying breed of pioneering Internet money-making schemes like the pyramid scheme emails and banner ads. Eventually the spammers will move on to other means of money making because their revenue is guaranteed to drop off as their tactics turn more and more people off.
Instead of fighting the good fight here, the best thing to do is let this dying ember peter out on its own. Forcing spammers to use more drastic tactics just results in them doing more harm in the long run. If there had been no resistance at all, we'd probably be seeing a much more mature and respectable online advertising industry instead of the random, haphazard, and very annoying multitude of spam king wannabes downloading their spam kits and setting up shop.
I have been pwned because my
Here's your fly in the soup:
/me sees domains like a cat walking on your keyboard being used as throw-away domain for spamming. (lkjshret.com IN RMX 0/0)
It only works when receiving mail with an forged and uncooperative sender-address. Nothing will prevent a spammer listing 0.0.0.0/0 as authorized sender addresses provided he controls the DNS for the envelope-sender.
It will increase the cost of a spam-run, and that's good news. On second thought: I like it.
This is a really weak argument to continue to allow anyone to impersonate me (well, to pretend to be allowed to send mail for my domain). There are two simple reasons why:
Basically, if you aren't happy with RMX, just find a different ISP (probably one that is spammer friendly, go figure) or set up your own domain. I like this solution because the market can decide whether or not it will be useful and user choice (in spam filters) can be preserved.
I hope we'll be able to add this useful tool to SpamAssassin soon.
(I agree with you entirely about "spam" already having a perfectly good definition: UBE. I suspect their weasel-words are due to the influence of the DMA and their allies who claim that spam is only a problem because of fraud and scams. No, spam is a problem because I'm being flooded by UBE. I don't care if it's fraudulent or not.)
But here's the fun part: As a recipient, each user sets up their account with a "deposit price" for bypassing the whitelist. You can set that price to any amount in your currency of choice. As a sender, you can set the maximum amount that you're willing to pay, so that you don't suddenly get billed/debited/charged some outrageous fee. If someone who is not on your whitelist needs to send you an email, they pay a deposit. When you receive the email, you either accept it or reject it. If you accept it, you do not get paid; the sender keeps the deposit. If you reject it (meaning you've read the email and decided it was spam), the deposit paid by the sender is paid to you. It's enough to set the deposit to something like 50 cents. You'll probably get highly targeted emails at this price. I wouldn't mind risking 50 cents to send someone an email that I think they'll accept. You could set it to a few dollars to reduce the noise even further. But you could set it to any price you want. If you REALLY don't want email from sources not included in your whitelist, you could set the deposit to thousands of dollars. With this system, you'll be HAPPY to receive spam! And spammers either won't be able to afford it, or recipients will start making some money.
The spam issue has some interesting parallels in the models of the new economy. Just like in other industries like healthcare and pharmacuticals, the major players are not interested in a "cure". That's not profitable for them. A more appealing approach for them is some method of "treatment", preferably something that obligates the user to continually do business with them in perpetuity in order to maintain their spam-free condition.
Efforts to regulate the content of spam messages, inconsequential civil penalties, client side filtering, and any system which filters mail based on content caters to this impotent approach to addressing the spam problem. It offers no cure. It does nothing to reduce spam; it does nothing to discourage spammers; it does nothing to address the most serious problem of spam, which involves unfair and often illegal exploitation of resources.
Maybe this is the new way. We don't actually solve any problems. We just put bandaids on them and allow them to consume more wasted resources, and the demand for more resources, hardware and bandwith is what drives the new economy.
Call me idealistic, but I think it sucks. I am appalled that so many people will settle for such shallow and ineffective approaches to these problems. But I guess I shouldn't be surprised. Most of these people profit from the existence of spam so why bite the hand that feeds them on a major artery when you can collect some bucks and merely trim their nails?
Slashdot is for geeks so I guess a technical solution to spam seems logical. However, is fixing this legally really that hard? First, it is a problem that has governments and corporations and users - in fact everyone except the spammers - are all on one side. It should be possible to get an international agreement to ban spam in this case. International agreements can/do work if they have support and they are realistic (for example banning CFCs worked). So the support is there - is it realistic? One of the things this group avoided is to try to define spam. But why do you need to have a precise definition? Something simple should work like:
For any mass email that is sent, the sender must be able to prove that the receieve gave his/her permission. Certain standards could be set here (eg. this permission must be opt-in for example). All bulk email must contain the details of the sending company and the option to ask said company to remove your details. Any company violating any of these rules or *aiding* a company to conceal this information (eg running an open gateway) should be fined heavily. Any country not signing up should be suject to sanctions (eg they cannot receieve international internet access or IT services from any signing country until they enforce these laws).
Now there are probably places where suggesting like this could be refined - but why is a legal solution to this problem such a wrong idea in general?!